Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Public Engagement Communications topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Fargo Arts and Culture Commission endorses outreach strategy; staff outlines weekly posts, ZenCity engagement
Summary
The commission voted to recommend the final "ROI: Ripples of Impact" document and heard a communications plan from city staff proposing weekly social posts, neighborhood-targeted outreach on Nextdoor and deeper public discussion tools in ZenCity.
The Fargo Arts and Culture Commission on Feb. 19 voted to recommend the final "ROI: Ripples of Impact" document and heard a detailed communications and public-engagement strategy from city communications staff.
The plan, presented by Greg Shildberger of Communications and Government Affairs, calls for one coordinated arts-and-culture post per week on the city’s primary social channels, quarterly feature stories tied to the ROI report, a searchable online catalog of public-art pieces, and targeted neighborhood engagement using Nextdoor and the digital engagement platform ZenCity. "The goal is 1 post every week that we would have on arts and culture on our main pages for the organization," Shildberger said.
Why it matters: Commission members said the outreach work is intended to broaden who the city hears from and to increase public understanding of public-art processes — from procurement and installation through maintenance. Staff said the tools will produce measurable feedback to guide future arts programming and budgeting.
Key elements of the communications plan
- Weekly core posts: Staff proposed one coordinated arts-and-culture post per week on the city’s main channels to maintain visibility and drive engagement.
- Quarterly storytelling: Communications staff said it will work with Arts and Culture and Planning staff to identify one or two "untold" stories per quarter from the ROI report for longer features pitched to media partners and posted online.
- Public-art catalog: Staff proposed adding pages to the city website that list each public-art piece with artist, materials, installation year and the work’s stated inspiration so visitors can learn more while touring public artworks.
- Neighborhood targeting via Nextdoor: Presenters said Nextdoor reaches about 57% of Fargo residents and will be useful for neighborhood-specific prompts and invitations to engage.
- ZenCity and Engage: Staff described ZenCity’s organic-monitoring feature, a city-hosted "Engage" hub for in-depth conversations, and optional pulse surveys that provide scientifically valid, representative results for specific topics. Staff said ZenCity already aggregates hundreds of thousands of local interactions; the presenters cited a figure of 707,853 interactions in the previous 180 days across channels tracked by the tool.
Tracking and reporting
Staff said they will provide a biannual progress report to the commission that includes social sentiment analysis, unique website visitors, media reach for the quarterly stories and engagement results from ZenCity’s Engage hub. The presenters emphasized they will report successes and what did not work so the strategy can be adjusted.
Commission response and next steps
Commission members praised the plan as a long-awaited step toward more consistent public engagement. Planning and Communications staff said they will coordinate with the commission on survey questions, neighborhood prompts and content priorities and bring reports back to the commission twice a year. No formal action was taken on the communications plan itself during the presentation beyond the commission’s earlier recommendation of the ROI document.
The commission’s next regular meeting was set for May 21.
